| Clubname: | Sunderland Royal Rovers |
| Fullname: | Sunderland Royal Rovers Football Club |
| Nickname: | the Royalists,[1] the Rovers |
| Founded: | 1884 |
| Dissolved: | 1918 |
| Capacity: | Unknown |
| Chrtitle: | President |
| Chairman: | George Bell[2] |
| Mgrtitle: | Secretary |
| Manager: | W. T. Lazenby |
| Pattern La1: | _red_stripes |
| Pattern B1: | _red_stripes |
| Pattern Ra1: | _red_stripes |
| Shorts1: | 000000 |
| Socks1: | 000000 |
| Pattern Name2: | Change |
| Leftarm2: | 0000FF |
| Body2: | 0000FF |
| Rightarm2: | 0000FF |
| Shorts2: | FFFFFF |
| Socks2: | 0000FF |
Sunderland Royal Rovers Football Club[3] was an English association football club based in Sunderland, England, formed in 1884.
The club was founded in 1884 by a group of eight- and nine-year old friends, who clubbed together to buy an India rubber football for fourpence; the boys chose the name Royal Rovers after a public house near to the home of one of the boys' grandparents. As the side grew and aged together, the players looked for more competitive football, and was a founder member of the Wearside Alliance in 1892, winning the title in 1894–95;[4] the club increasingly used the name Sunderland Royal Rovers following this triumph.[5] The club joined the more prestigious Wearside League in 1896, and at the turn of the century became the strongest non-league side in the area; it won the League every year from 1900–01 to 1903–04, and in the first of those seasons also won two local competitions (the Shipowners' Cup and Monkwearmouth Charity Cup).[6] One of its founder players - Ralph Scott - was still vice-captain for the club as late as the 1904–05 season.[7]
The Rovers moved up to a national level by entering the FA Cup qualifying rounds from 1901–02 onwards. The club never reached the first round proper; its best run was to the final qualifying stage in 1902–03, at which stage the club lost at Bishop Auckland.[8]
The club left the Wearside League in 1906 to become one of the founder members of the new North Eastern League, which featured the stronger non-league clubs and the reserve sides of the Football League clubs - although the Rovers attended the initial meetings,[9] the decision to restrict the first season to ten clubs meant the club was left out as first alternative,[10] but the withdrawals of West Hartlepool and Hull City created space for the Rovers and West Stanley.[11] This required the club to turn semi-professional, paying 10s per match.[12]
After a couple of decent seasons, the lure of better pay meant the club haemorrhaged players to better-resourced sides, and it spent the last part of the decade at the bottom of the table.[13]
Before the 1910–11 season, the club shortened its name to Sunderland Rovers,[14] and by the start of the First World War had recovered to mid-table status. However, the club's existence ended during the War, as the British Army took over its ground in April 1918,[15] and the club's failure to send a representative to a meeting of the new North Eastern League in April 1919 was taken as tacit acceptance that the club had died.[16] The Rovers' final reported game was a first round Shipowners' Cup defeat at Sunderland West End in February 1918.[17]
The club wore red and white stripes - colours common in many Wearside clubs, including Wallsend Park Villa, North Shields,[18] and, of course, Sunderland A.F.C. - with photographic evidence demonstrating the shirts were accompanied by black shorts and socks. The club's change shirt was blue.[19]
After its initial games on ad hoc patches of ground behind the dockside cattle sheds, the club found a permanent home in 1895 at the old Blue House Ground in Hendon,[20] re-christened the Royal Rovers Ground.[21]